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This work is a study of the nature and origin of nationality and modern social ideals in the Middle East, particularly Egypt, in the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. Bringing together writings on political and social reform with literary works, Noorani challenges dominant assumptions about the emergence of modernity. It shows that while nationalist, liberal, and democratic ideals emerged in the Middle East under European influence, these ideals were nevertheless created out of existing cultural values by reformers and intellectuals. The central element of this process, the book argues, was the transformation of virtue into nationality.

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Sovereign Virtue and the Emergence of Nationality The Death of the Hero and the Birth of Bourgeois Class Publicity Order, Agency, and the Economy of Desire: Islamic Reformism and Arab Nationalism The Moral Transformation of Femininity and the Rise of the Public-Private Division Fiction, Hegemony, and the Aesthetic Dimension of Citizenship Excess, Rebellion, and Revolution: Egyptian Modernity in the ´Trilogy´ of Nagib Mahfuz

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YASEEN NOORANI is an Assistant Professor of Near Eastern Studies at the University of Arizona, USA.

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